We are putting out a fantasy setting and have some color maps we'd like to use in the first few pages. But most printers I have talked to told me they treat the whole book as if it is in color, even if the remaining pages are B&W. Does anyone know of a POD printer that will only charge for the pages that are in color if the book is mixed?

I imagine they are saying it will all be color or not is due to pagination. If they have one color page in a folio the other sheets in that folio will need to be printed on the same machine. Switching out one printer to the next during production would be a pain. If it is perfect bound the pagination problem in therory should be less but in fact is the same. If they print on a different printer they need to go back and by hand add in the color pages. A pain in the ass if you're doing it for many books or if it has color in more than one place.

I imagine they are saying it will all be color or not is due to pagination. If they have one color page in a folio the other sheets in that folio will need to be printed on the same machine. Switching out one printer to the next during production would be a pain. If it is perfect bound the pagination problem in therory should be less but in fact is the same. If they print on a different printer they need to go back and by hand add in the color pages. A pain in the ass if you're doing it for many books or if it has color in more than one place.

While it may be a pain in the ass, any printer (POD or otherwise) worth his salt should be able to do it. The extra price for collation is normally added in to the cost of the printed page.

They certainly can do it but whither they will do it is open to each company to decide. When they are starved for work they'd be fools to turn down a check but in fatter times it would be like the question "Do you pick up pennies?"

I don't judge companies badly who don't want to do this - they just might lose my business.